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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. That's a lot of reading. Consensus is that he does not meet NPROF, and that other notability critieria (i.e. GNG) is also not met. This subject may become notable in the future, as indicated by the lengthy discussion. 78.26 ( spin me / revolutions) 03:36, 3 October 2018 (UTC) reply

Steve Turley

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The coverage (references, external links, etc.) does not seem suffiscient to justify this article passing Wikipedia:General notability guideline and the more detailed Wikipedia:Notability (biographies) requirement. There is no in-depth coverage of him outside few author blurbs, likely written by the subject. He doesn't pass WP:NPROF (I checked Google Scholar; he doesn't seem to have any works that are significantly cited, plus he publishes as one of several co-authors) or WP:NARTIST (writer, journalist, YouTuber); he is mildly successful on several fronts, but not enough to win any awards, recognition, coverage - or notability. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 07:42, 11 September 2018 (UTC) reply

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  • Keep (as original creator of the article) Turley may not be a recognized name to the average Joe, but I think he's notable enough in his field of work. Piotrus, you mention his lack of "any awards, recognition, and coverage." However, he has multiple awards (as noted in the article) from his days as a classical guitarist, which earned him recognition on The 700 Club, he is internationally recognized in the circles of classical and Christian education (recently speaking at the Educacao Crista Classica Conference in Sao Paulo, Brazil), and in terms of coverage, his writing and videos have been featured by The American Conservative and Rod Dreher, Lew Rockwell, and Pat Buchanan. Combined with the rapid growth of Turley's online presence via his YouTube channel, I think his notability is only going to continue to rise at this point. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 18:12, 11 September 2018 (UTC) reply
Every award that exists at all is not an automatic notability freebie — only certain specific nationally notable awards (such as the Grammys in the case of a musician) count as notability claims, while most minor specialist or regional awards do not. The extent to which an award counts as an article-clinching notability claim in and of itself is strictly coterminous with the extent to which media can be shown to care about reporting the winners of that award as news. And neither is notability conferred on the basis of where his writing or video work has been "featured" — it's conferred on the basis of sources in which he's the subject of coverage written by other people, and not on the basis of sources in which he's the author of coverage about other things. Bearcat ( talk) 14:30, 19 September 2018 (UTC) reply
    • While there are some cases where 'not enough in any field', combined, can seem to make one notable enough, notability as a sum of non-notable life paths is hard to achieve. In this case, I stand by my initial assessment - not notable in any field, nor in their sum. But let's see what others say. -- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 09:17, 12 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Delete I can see a couple of old newspapers listings of concerts where he played guitar, but they are just listings, nothing to support notability as a musician. Similarly, he does publish opinion essays, and 2 books, but no reviews, profiles, feature coverage or anything else to support notability as WP:AUTHOR. His Youtube think does not get discussed in the media (a couple of bloggers have mentioned it,) and I see no indication that his academic career passed WP:PROF. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 20:25, 12 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • keep seems to meet WP:NPROF, per User:Bcschneider53's reasoning. desmay ( talk) 23:56, 12 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • noting that User:Bcschneider53 does not offer any reason why Turley would meet PROF. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 11:16, 13 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ E.M.Gregory: I'm in the process of collecting sources to strengthen my argument. My college schedule is pretty hectic but I'm hoping I can get back to you this evening. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 11:38, 13 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Please feel free to ping me to revisit when you've gathered them. What would be most persuasive would be WP:SIGCOV published before he became a candidate, or a demonstration that some of his publications or activities have had WP:IMPACT described in WP:RS. But do keep in mind that, for example, keynoting a conference does not confer notability unless it is discussed in a source (such as a newspaper) with no connection to the outfit sponsoring the conference. And that it not notability in itself that keeps pages up, only the recognition/confirmation of an individual's notability in reliable, secondary sources independent of the subject can do that. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 11:46, 13 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ Bcschneider53:, I think the "Scholarship" subhead could use expansion on the subject of his thesis/book, which could be drawn from the reviews. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 14:52, 27 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ E.M.Gregory: I agree. His "books" section (where the thesis/book info currently sits) has been expanded at the moment to include other titles I previously mentioned here, but also to include a couple of his self-published works, of which he has several more through CreateSpace. If his article stays, would they be notable enough to include here? I'm genuinely asking because I don't know; thought self-published works were to be avoided as much as possible, though if one of them is getting coverage in The Epoch Times, I suppose that adds credibility to the work. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 19:14, 27 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Another academic review: The Ritualized Revelation of the Messianic Age: Washings and Meals in Galatians and 1 Corinthians. By Stephen Richard Turley. The Ritualized Revelation of the Messianic Age: Washings and Meals in Galatians and 1 CorinthiansStephen Richard Turley, reviewed by Jan Heilmann, The Journal of Theological Studies, Volume 67, Issue 2, 1 October 2016, Pages 738–740, https://doi.org/10.1093/jts/flw164. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 15:45, 13 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • and another: The Ritualized Revelation of the Messianic Age: Washings and Meals in Galatians and 1 Corinthians By StephenRichard Turley. , 2015. reviewed by Jason Maston in the Religious Studies Review, 22 December 2016 https://doi.org/10.1111/rsr.12709. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 15:56, 13 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Keep This 2015 scholarly book is sufficiently widely reviewed to pass WP:AUTHOR. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 15:56, 13 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Keep Meets NAUTHOR as well as GNG. ~ EDDY ( talk/ contribs)~ 16:02, 13 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Keep. Satisfies GNG and AUTHOR with multiple periodical reviews. James500 ( talk) 20:01, 13 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Keep and probably WP:TNT as it feels overly promotional. I don't think WP:GNG is satisfied, but he clearly satisfies WP:NAUTHOR - the problem is he's notable for being an author, and this information is buried. SportingFlyer talk 02:09, 14 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Delete I feel similarly to Piotrus below. The article was written in such a way to say "these books were reviewed in these places." The Oxford review talks about him - his book? - as his doctoral thesis. I looked at the article again after someone did an important WP:TNT and there's not a whole lot there - I'm not convinced he satisfies WP:NACADEMIC or WP:AUTHOR, and I assumed above the author notability from the article, which said "his books were reviewed in X and Y and Z" - written as if to establish notability. Furthermore, as pointed out below, these are academic book reviews which point to academia and not authorship as we know it, and he clearly fails WP:NPROF. SportingFlyer talk 05:59, 15 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ SportingFlyer: If it makes a difference, the article has been expanded again since the WP:TNT to further establish the subject's notability. I would welcome your second (or I suppose third?) opinion on it if you're willing to take another look. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 19:29, 16 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ Bcschneider53: I think one of the problems with the article is it was originally so promotional it was hard to figure out which notability guideline it should be reviewed as. As it is now written, it appears his notability comes from WP:NPROF, but he's an adjunct/affiliate faculty member, with no showing of being enough to qualify for WP:NPROF. The other news sources appear to cover him as a student and would not get him to alternative guidelines under WP:NMUSIC. WP:AUTHOR has been previously discussed. As a whole, I just don't think WP:GNG is met. SportingFlyer talk 20:43, 16 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Comment. I commend User:Bcschneider53 on finding the alt name the subject uses in academia. I am however not convinced the reviews of his book estabilish hist notability. I think the reviews may be sufficient to establish notability for the book itself per WP:NBOOK, but being an author of a single book that got several reviews is IMHO not enough to pass WP:PROF (see also: WP:NOTINHERITED). Searching under his alt name, I am still not seeing that his work is having any impact - his most popular work seems to have been cited six (6) times: [1]. And his books seems to have been cited ONLY TWO TIMES. As such, while I have considered withdrawing this nom, I have decided not to do so, as I do not agree he meets notability criteria for an academic - please look at WP:NACADEMIC - which criteria is he meeting as an academic? IMHO still none. As for WP:AUTHOR, the issue is whether several academic reviews of an otherwise non-cited book are sufficient for CREATIVE#3: "The person has created or played a major role in co-creating a significant or well-known work or collective body of work. In addition, such work must have been the primary subject of an independent and notable work (for example, a book, film, or television series, but usually not a single episode of a television series) or of multiple independent periodical articles or reviews.". While I think it could be well argued such reviews as presented above do fulfill the "multiple independent periodical articles or reviews" part, please note that to pass that CREATIVE#3 the work in question also has to be "significant or well-known". I do not believe that a book with TWO CITATIONS to its name is significant or well-known (ping users who think PROF/CREATIVE does suffice for further discussion: @ E.M.Gregory, Editorofthewiki, James500, and SportingFlyer: and ping User:DGG for an outside further comment - what do you think?). -- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 06:08, 14 September 2018 (UTC) reply

Your arguments are completely wrong from start to finish. Book reviews are what make an author in the humanities notable. Citations are largely irrelevant because these are low citation fields to begin with. Two citations is not that bad for some of these fields. James500 ( talk) 03:08, 15 September 2018 (UTC) reply

    • I work professionally in the field of humanities (social sciences->sociology). In my field, publications in top journals mater more then books, unless said books become bestsellers or are at least widely known, which is not the case here. For example, Charles Tilly's books - not national bestsellers, but known to any sociologist of social movements - have thousands of citations ( [2]). I'd be willing to consider even double digits in it citations as evidence of notability, but two? Nope. Despite what you claim, a widely known book will have numerous cites. His 2-cite book from a minor (if reliable) publisher ( T&T Clark) is not enough to make him a notable scholar. At least in sociology/history. Perhaps theology has lower standards, I can't comment on that. And the argument about it being only from 2015? Sure... that's WP:TOOSOON. We can undelete this if in few years someone shows his book has now citations in double digits, let's say >30. How about that? -- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 09:13, 18 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Reaffirming KEEP. It is WP standard operating procedure at AfD for a writer, including humanities professors, to pass AUTHOR, 3."The person has created... a significant or well-known work.... In addition, such work must have been the primary subject of.... multiple independent periodical articles or reviews." Professors can and routinely do pass WP:AUTHOR by writing books that get respectfully reviewed in respected journals. The journals in which Turley's book was reviewed, The Journal of Theological Studies, Religious Studies Review, The Society of Biblical Literature - these are serious, scholarly journals. 2 other things to be aware of: 1. the sheer volume of authors reviewed at AfD every week. Most books get -zero- reviews, the snippet promo "review: at Pub. Weekly, then... nada. As for scholarly citations of The Ritualized Revelation of the Messianic Age: Washings and Meals in Galatians and 1 Corinthians, it's a 2015 book, and it is usual in humanities fields where people still publish in print on arcane topics for a few years to pass between publication, and citation by fellow scholars. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 11:30, 14 September 2018 (UTC) reply
    • I agree. The books themselves do not have to be notable, but they need to be reviewed in reputable journals. Turley's work merits him an article. ~ EDDY ( talk/ contribs)~ 15:17, 14 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Delete. not notable under WP:PROF or under WP:AUTHOR or in any of his other fields. As for author, we never base that6 on a single published book unless it becomes a best seller--that would be truly INDISCRIMINATE. As for WP:PROF: he has no regular academic position at a university. He has published only one book, based only on his dissertation , which had a few routine reviewsThe standard for notability in the humanities is indeed books, not journal articles, but it takes more than one of them. In practice, our WP:PROF standard in all fields amounts to full professorship at a research university., and almost everyone who has articles under this criterion has met that, I would (and have) argued for years it should be set a little lower, at Associate Professor at the very best universities. In neither case, does one published book meet that, especially one that is based on the dissertation. His single work has had minimal impact on his field. And his career reflects the failure to meet the standards of the profession.
In fact the article shows good signs of bing a promotional bio: the inclusion of his non-notable work in multiple unrelated fields, the quote about why he switched fields --both of them are characteristic of over-personal promotional bios. I am strongly in favor of increasing our coverage of scholars in the humanities, and religion has been especially neglected here. There are tens of thousands of needed bios of those who are actually notable/ DGG ( talk ) 15:36, 14 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • DGG, I took your point, removed PROMO form the page, and ran a couple of additional searches using Stephen, Steve, middle initial keywords. Added a brief but well-sourced section on his career as a classical guitarist (long profile in the Baltimore Sun, and material from an interesting, lengthy analysis of his scripture-tinged political commentary drawn from somebody's recent PhD dissertation. I think this will satisfy your concerns. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 11:37, 16 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Comment @ DGG: Turley has actually published more than one book; his T&T Clark work is certainly his most notable, but he has published and co-authored several others through Classical Academic Press and Canon Press. (Just a few examples: 1 2 3.) And "no regular academic position at a university"? This is his 20th year at Eastern in the same position he has always held: professor of world music and aesthetics. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 16:48, 14 September 2018 (UTC) reply
I had searches the first 2 of the 3 titles you mention before I wrote my first comment, I couldn't find any SECONDARY sources, news articles, reviews. There really seems to be very little about him in WP:RS, just one book reviewed in scholarly journals. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 20:17, 14 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • I do see DGG's point. Bcschneider53's here's a good rule of thumb: If you can't source something to WP:SIGCOV in multiple, independent, WP:RS - it doesn't belong on the page. Also, writing opinion columns in NOT NOTABLE and does not get onto the page. The exception is people who become such well known commentators that other people write articles in WP:RS publications about the fact that they write opinion columns, I have taken out all of the youtube, musician, political commentator hype out of both the text and the infobox. What we can source is his 2015 book and his post as a college professor. I'm thinking.... I may come back and strike my opinion. Gonna think it over. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 20:10, 14 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Delete per nom. No in-depth coverage can be found except for Christian trade publications. The subject has written one book from a small press with no independent third-party reliable source coverage. Does not pass WP:Author and WP:GNG, and notability has not been met for WP:PROF. The article has a promotional feel to it. Fails notability guidelines. - AuthorAuthor ( talk) 21:54, 14 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Will do. Yes, notability is still an issue. Thank you. - AuthorAuthor ( talk) 22:33, 14 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • There is no such thing as a Christian trade publication because Christianity is not a trade. James500 ( talk) 03:02, 15 September 2018 (UTC) reply
These are highly regarded scholarly journals, absolutely WP:RS. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 23:07, 15 September 2018 (UTC) reply
Exaggerations and puffery" He is not a professor, and not even full time university faculty in any sense. His web page at Eastern says "Affiliate Faculty; Specialty: World Music, Theology, Classical Guitar " and "Stephen Turley is a part-time teacher of world music and aesthetics at Eastern University, and a full-time faculty member at Tall Oaks Classical School" [3]. In other words, he is a high school teacher with a part time adjunct position at a university. 2/WP:PROF does not apply to him. because he is not a professor of any sort, nor a researcher or scholar. He wrote a PhD thesis, and published it as a book. That's not enough to call someone a scholar, even loosely. Nor do we call high school teachers professors, or even academics. 3/ But even though it does not apply here, I do point out the WP:PROF does not require secondary sources, just RS that its requirements be met--it is a specific exception to the GNG . There is little consensus about the relationship of the other special notability guidelines to the GNG, but this one is written down explicitly. For WP:PROF, the standard fot books is publication by a major academic press, but again, the requirement is several books. The standards isn't reviews, because If it is published by a major academic press, there are always reviews in academic journals--but regardless of reviews, any number of non academic books do not contribute to notability under WP:PROF. DGG ( talk ) 05:23, 15 September 2018 (UTC) reply
He is verifiably a scholar. We do not hold lack of a full-time appointment against people who publish veritably scholarly books and articles. There are independent scholars, and part-time faculty who do highly regarded work. Some work for indsutry, some teach high school, if his job is cited inaccurately FIX IT. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 23:07, 15 September 2018 (UTC) reply
Patrick Henry College, a highly respected private classical liberal arts college in Virginia where Turley has given lectures in the past, considers him to be a "professor of Fine Arts" at Eastern. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 16:49, 19 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Comment I just did a Google search and the subject shows up on conspiracy theorist sites as a spokesperson. Just my take on it, but this Wiki article appears to be a possible effort at legitimizing the subject. - AuthorAuthor ( talk) 06:39, 15 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ AuthorAuthor: What “conspiracy theory sites” is he showing up on? I’m genuinely curious, because I researched him extensively and was not aware of any. I suppose it’s not a big deal now since this ultimately has little to no chance of surviving AfD at this point but I want to be very clear that legitimizing a “conspiracy theorist” was not my intention in creating this article. — Bcschneider53 ( talk) 12:45, 15 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ Bcschneider53:, I did not see them at first either. He is all over nationalist sites and on YouTube as a conspiracy theorist, including promoting the 15,000 white South African farmers conspiracy. I would hate to repost any of those sites and YouTube channels here so I will not be sharing. If you continue paging down on Google, you will come across them. - AuthorAuthor ( talk) 17:28, 15 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • AuthorAuthor, I think we need to be extremely careful about branding living people as "conspiracy theorists," even on talk pages. Turly was among the many Americans who fell for this [4] July 9 fake news story from Russia Today. I never use Russia Today as a source on anything, I don't trust RT and I personally do not regard it as a reliable source on anything, not even on whether it's snowing in Moscow. But you're proposing to delete a BLP because the subject repeated one of RT's fake news stories on social media. Frankly who among us has never retweeted a fake news story? I remember one I swallowed whole, it was written by one of the most highly regarded journalists at the New York Times and stated that she (the journalist) had verified that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction...... but I digress. For a broader view of Turley, look at this report on Right Wing Watch, an outfit I would trust to know how far out there a YouTube personality is. Their July 2017 report: Writer Calls Trump Presidency ‘Redemptive,’ Part Of ‘Trajectory’ To Bring Us Pence portrays Turley as a conservative Christian who likes Trump but who would strongly prefer to have an evangelical Christian like Mike Pence in the Oval Office. According to Right Wing Watch, we're not talking Alex Jones here. Just a theology and music teacher who has a non-notable YouTube blog. And who supports "conservative nationalist populism" - his own words; prompted by AuthorAuthor's assertions I listened. I get that AuthorAuthor finds Turley's politically abhorrent, but the fact that an editor disagrees politically with the subject of a page is not an argument for deleting the page. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 22:41, 15 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • WP:HEY in addition to adding a profile/feature on Turley's career as a musician form the Baltimore Sun, I added a section on Turley's political commentary drawn from a lengthy analysis of his political thought in somebody's recent PhD dissertation. the dissertation discusses Turley as a political commentator who draws on formal theological arguments based on texts in Christian scripture. I continue to think that there is enough here to KEEP. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 11:17, 16 September 2018 (UTC) reply
    Comment If I may, I'd like to request a status update. If I counted correctly, I think we stand at five Keep votes and four Delete votes. While I know AfD is not based on a popular vote, I do think E.M.Gregory's recent updates have the article in much better shape than it was, establishing the subject's legitimacy and notability. I'll admit that while I created the article primarily due to his academic career, I figured I might as well include his YouTube info to make the article as complete as possible. I've always been more of an inclusionist; as long as it isn't blatant trivia, I'm usually okay with keeping material so long as it can be reliably sourced. This was my first attempt at writing an article in this subject area, and I think I've learned a lot about the notability guidelines for the future.
    That said, even without the YouTube/Turley Talks/online blog info, I think the article as it stands is complete enough to warrant it surviving AfD. I also still dispute DGG's claim that Turley is not a professor or scholar; his dissertation was rigorously scrutinized and reviewed, and he's held the same position at Eastern for over two decades, but we can continue that discussion later. The most important thing to me now is that I believe we've done enough to get the article in good enough condition for its subject's notability to be established and thus for the article to be kept. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 19:29, 16 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • This is not a vote. It is a discussion about policy, notability, and sufficiency of sources, not a nose count. I suggest you read the link on the template. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 21:44, 16 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ E.M.Gregory: I know it's not a vote, hence why I said: "I know AfD is not based on a popular vote." I was just trying to analyze the general overview of where this stands at the moment. I've participated in AfDs before and am generally speaking familiar with the process. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 21:50, 16 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Comment (to closing admin): please note that majority of keep votes appeared early on, and were essentially 'keep per PROF/WRITER'. I and DGG provided arguments why this is not correct, and I pinged each of the voters. Majority chose not to respond here, sadly, but I'll stress again that we have demonstrated hopefully, that rationale for those keep votes is insufficient (the subject does not pass PROF/CREATIVE). -- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 09:03, 18 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • I still think Turley meets criteria No. 1 under WP:NACADEMIC, "The person's research has had a significant impact in their scholarly discipline, broadly construed, as demonstrated by independent reliable sources." His dissertation (and subsequent publication) was a specialized study that broke new ground on rituals in early Christianity, receiving multiple scholarly reviews as well as one by prominent NT scholar Peter Leithart. The project was also overseen by Durham's John M. G. Barclay, one of the most influential NT scholars of this era. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 15:02, 18 September 2018 (UTC) reply
not every doctoral student overseen by a notable scholar is notable. DGG ( talk ) 18:35, 18 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Comment - I concur with @ DGG:. The subject has co-authored with other writers and has received no awards and no significant, nor wide coverage in independent publications. As a high-school teacher and part-time adjunct, the subject fails WP:NPROF and WP:NACADEMIC. Fails WP:GNG as well. Perhaps with time, it will happen. As of now, the article still does not meet notability guidelines. - AuthorAuthor ( talk) 02:30, 19 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Userfy or send to WP:AfC -- appears to be a published author with quite few books based on Amazon.com's page here and per E.M.Gregory, James500. I was considering keep, but reading the other comments above I have some reservations. Although Amazon.com page is not secondary WP:RS (probably written by Turley) and it is possible these are self-published works, my feeling now that there may be enough secondary RS, but not yet fully convinced. Please note that some if not most of the current or recent RS is in the article such as his PhD (and [5]) are not appropriate for sourcing and not secondary. Delete -- I clicked on the refs/footnotes, and they go to something other than what they are supposed to be sourced to. My assumption is this page is some sort of joke on us used for advertising. If someone wants to convince me there is WP:RS for this person that makes him notable, please tell me where to look in the above wall-of-text or give me some links to good secondary sources. Feel free to ping me. I perused it and did not see SECONDARY sources about him. I saw things that he may have authored. -- David Tornheim ( talk) 06:00, 19 September 2018 (UTC) [revised 08:23, 20 September 2018 (UTC)] reply
  • @ David Tornheim: David, you have to be kidding me. I'm an editor with good intentions trying to make this project the best it can be. What happened to assuming good faith? I created the page because I believed he was notable enough on his academics and mistakenly included other non-notable things in an effort to make the page as complete as possible. As far as secondary sources, what refs are you talking about that "go to something other than what they are supposed to be sourced to?" Or that are a "joke" (as you mention in your edit summary)? E.M. Gregory did a great job revamping the article to fill in holes that I had previously missed to further establish his academics and political commentary. The first two refs seem to be behind a paywall so I'll fix that by adding a note to that in the refs, but please don't just assume that this page was created as a joke. I made some honest mistakes, yes, but I had no malicious intentions whatsoever. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 12:13, 19 September 2018 (UTC) reply
Please take a look at the first two refs from this version. They both go to Columbia University libraries rather than where the refs say they go to. I see that the first one has been fixed to [6] in the more recent version. That's better. I'm glad to hear it's not a joke. I will reconsider now that at least some of the refs are fixed. -- David Tornheim ( talk) 07:12, 20 September 2018 (UTC) reply
These 2 articles were linked to link to Proquest News Archive, it is paywalled. It is an article in Newsday about a concert in which Turley played, the other is a long feature story in the Baltimore Sun about Turley as a young concert musician. Our policy is to WP:AGF about paywalled references. Line book reviews, a PROFILE article in a major daily papers demonstrates notability. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 09:54, 20 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Delete. Bcschneider and others have done a good job of digging deep for evidence of notability; unfortunately, that their extensive efforts have produced so little result convinces me that this individual isn't, in fact, notable. Somebody without a formal tenured position, whose most popular paper has six citations, and whose h-index so far as I can tell is not higher than 2, falls significantly short of WP:PROF. Similarly, I don't think their book (just one book, mind you) has received the level of coverage necessary for making its author notable. It's not a bestseller; I don't see it being widely cited. Vanamonde ( talk) 16:16, 19 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • H-index is useful for some fields, less so for biblical studies where serious work is published in books, and it can take years for a well-received book to be cited in other books. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 10:00, 20 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • So in thew few years when he gets such cites this can be restored. WP:TOOSOON, simply. Biblical studies or whatever don't get exception to needing citations, two cites, no matter what discipline, even most esoteric, simply means no impact. -- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 01:42, 22 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ Piotrus: Does it really make a difference how notable a work in a lesser-studied field is if it has three citations or thirty? The number of citations doesn't change the work or its content itself. It is still a scholarly work that broke new ground in the NT field in the area of early Christian rituals. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 03:20, 22 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ Piotrus: I have updated the article with quotes from the reviews. I hope these will be convincing enough to show the importance and impact of his work in the field of NT rituals. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 23:56, 24 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Generally, most book reviews are positive. Impact is measured through citations, not reviews. As DGG said, publishers sent books to many journals, and usually a book gets reviewed somewhere. Now, as I said, this may be enough to prove the notability of a book. But not of an autor. WP:NAUTHOR does not contain a criteria "publish a single work which gets several reviews". Just like, analogically, video games are notable if they get several reviews, but their publishing company does not become automatically notable when that happens. Notability is not inherited. -- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 03:31, 27 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ Piotrus: "People are presumed notable if they have received significant coverage in multiple published secondary sources that are reliable, intellectually independent of each other, and independent of the subject." Turley has been reviewed by multiple scholarly (and thus reliable) journals who emphasize the impact his work has had in the field of New Testament rituals. What part of the quoted criteria exactly is he failing to meet? -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 03:56, 27 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • There are 3 claims to notability here. 1.) Coverage of his career as a musician (a promising-young-musician profile article,) 2.) academic book with multiple reviews in scholarly journals (including a deep dive by Peter Leithart. and 3.) serious people including Rod Dreher engaging with Turley as a political commentator. I also Note that there were unsupported, unsourced political accusations made against Turley by an editor in this discussion. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 10:08, 20 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Note: Others (specifically E.M.Gregory above) have brought up an important point that it sometimes takes years for scholarly reviews to start coming in, especially for lesser-researched fields. I just found another review here from Catholic Biblical Quarterly via EBSCO that was not published until about a year and a half after Turley's book went to print (January 2017). The citation also calls Turley's writing "both an engaging and important work" that "added a dimension to the reading of Paul by employing approaches found in cognate fields of study, in this case ritual." -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 00:21, 21 September 2018 (UTC) reply
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Christianity-related deletion discussions. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 09:58, 21 September 2018 (UTC) reply
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Persistent and well-based arguments for and against NAUTHOR, PROF and the likes till the very end lead to no consensus being evident currently; relisting the Afd for the next week
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Lourdes 14:13, 21 September 2018 (UTC) reply
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Academics and educators-related deletion discussions. XOR'easter ( talk) 15:26, 21 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Delete TOOSOON. All he has done so far is produce a PHD thesis and publish a book based on it. That is not yet enough to make him notable. Peterkingiron ( talk) 16:39, 23 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Even if we grant that "all" he has done in the field of academics is publish a single book (again, he has several others but this is only scholarly reviewed and cited one), his former career as a guitarist received coverage in The Baltimore Sun and serious people such as Rod Dreher and Pat Buchanan have engaged with his political commentary. I can see why the TOOSOON argument might be made for his academics (though I of course disagree), but what about the other claims to notability which E.M.Gregory highlights above? -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 18:24, 23 September 2018 (UTC) reply
that notable people have discussed politics with him does not make him notable; there is also no evidence he meets NMUSIC. Being non0notable in 3 fields does not make one notable. DGG ( talk ) 07:33, 25 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Personally, I am more impressed that Peter Leithart engaged with Turley's book at length. But do note that notability by WP standards can certainly be cumulative. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 19:42, 26 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ Piotrus: So you're telling me that Leithart shouldn't be considered a credible scholar based on his 30-something-year-old opinion of a board game? That seems a bit unfair. I don't think this discussion is going to get very far if we start criticizing people for something that unrelated to the subject at hand. So Leithart doesn't like Dungeons & Dragons. Okay. Fine. What does that have to do with Turley's article? -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 03:56, 27 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ Bcschneider53: Nothing, I was just replying to your comment about being impressed by Leithart. I am not (as in, neither impressed by his research, personally, nor by the fact that he reviewed that book). Not that I am saying it is a bad source, but Leithart is not one of the top dogs in his field - just one of many middling (notable, but not famous) scholars. Going back on topic, if Turley was close to Leithart's level of achievements, he would be notable. But he is not. Leithart is good comparison - he has more publications, dozens of citations, he seems to pass PROF. When Turley has similar resume, he can pass PROF too. For now, he doesn't. -- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 06:28, 27 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • revisiting, I discovered our articles on classical Christian education and the classical education movement, (I had understood the schools where Turley teaches as Christian and as classical, but had not realized that they are part of a contemporary education movement within which there is a specifically Christian movement - the serendipity of discovering this kind of stuff is my principal reason for editing here,) so I searched for him using Stephen + classical + education. And found a new article Teach Students About Beauty to Lead Them to Virtue in the Epoch Times, a sort of intellectual profile based on Turley's self-published 2018 book. I checked the writer, he writes several fine arts-related article for the paper every year, so the writer/article are legit. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 19:42, 26 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • That's how notability works: One book gets WP:SIGCOV from "Peter Leinhart," in your words above "Not that I am saying it is a bad source;" Another book gets a long newspaper interview, as you say "certainly a nice addition to external links;" 5 or 6 scholarly journals review a book; Somebody devotes several pages in his doctoral dissertation to analyzing your work; Rod Dreher goes INDEPTH on an article you wrote; the Baltimore Sun runs a long feature story about you, and you pass WP:NOTABILITY. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 21:16, 27 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Nom, can you explain why you [8] pinged User:DGG "for an outside further comment - what do you think?" with no indication of why pinging this particular editor should not be regarded as a form of Wikipedia:Canvassing. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 14:53, 27 September 2018 (UTC) reply
I do not think that canvassing. I have been known to change my mind as a discussion continues. I work on too many different things to follow them myself, and I rely on people to suggest where I might want to comment, or comment again, or change my comment. DGG ( talk ) 03:18, 29 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Note that Turley's articles in academic journals were very often published as Stephen Richard Turley, his youthful concert guitarist career was as Stephen Turley, he now seems to mostly use "Steve." There oughta be a law. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 10:46, 28 September 2018 (UTC) reply
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Pennsylvania-related deletion discussions. Thsmi002 ( talk) 04:46, 29 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Delete. I read the article again and again; as well as the references. I agree with Piotrus's argument. The article in my opinion fails WP:BIO and WP:GNG -- Jay ( talk) 17:02, 29 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Delete, my gut says fringe, i've not examined the refs and this afd is tldr - so ignore my vote if you wish. Szzuk ( talk) 07:44, 29 September 2018 (UTC) I'm redacting my own vote on the basis if I can't be bothered voting properly I shouldn't vote. Szzuk ( talk) 08:04, 29 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Delete per all comments after viewing discussion. Can't see reason to keep. Doesn't satisfy GNG either. Redditaddict69 (talk) (contribs) 20:01, 30 September 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Keep: Per E.M.Gregory and Bcschneider53. -- 1990'sguy ( talk) 13:55, 1 October 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Delete - sourcing is poor - very little that can be described as a reliable source. A Google search uncovers little else besides his videos on Youtube, and op eds. Fails WP:GNG. Arguments for keep claim one of his books is notable - if so, it should have the article, not him. TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 00:40, 2 October 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ Timtempleton: So let me get this straight: an article with references to The Baltimore Sun, Epoch Times, Newsday, three scholarly journals, and a two-part INDEPTH analysis from Peter Leithart is "poor"? If that's the case, I reckon the standards for this are far too high; this isn't a Good Article nomination on our hands here...I think this is more than enough to warrant the article's existence. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 02:37, 2 October 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Right, or as I'd put it, mentions in passing and business-as-usual routine reviews of a single book. Which do not suffice for an article at all, not too mention would be laughed out by any competent GA reviewer. -- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 04:32, 2 October 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Sure, but that's the point; I'm not suggesting this is a GA. I am suggesting that this has several reliable and scholarly sources, and if that "does not suffice for an article at all," then I'm not sure what does. Though of course, both of us are so set on our opinions that continuing to argue in circles like we have for the last three weeks isn't going to get us anywhere. I believe E.M.Gregory and I (though mostly him, credit where it's due) have vastly improved the article through enough secondary sources to establish that the subject is notable in his respective fields. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 14:01, 2 October 2018 (UTC) reply
  • The Baltimore Sun piece is a 27 year old human interest story about someone's 4th place finish in a competition. That's a reliable source, but isn't enough. You can find examples of similar arguments being made on the talk pages of 3rd and 4th place beauty pageant finalists, if any of those articles are left. If you found 7-9 more reliable sources about him, and they included at least two in-depth profiles, we'd be on the same notability page. TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 17:22, 2 October 2018 (UTC) reply
  • Recommend that User:Bcschneider53 save this one in a file somewhere and bring it back after some significant publication runs another profile, one of Turley's essays of videos draws broad attention, or he publishes another impactful scholarly article or book. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 23:10, 2 October 2018 (UTC) reply
  • @ E.M.Gregory: I will do that. Thanks again for your efforts in helping improve the article; I truly appreciate it.
  • To the closing admin, if this cannot be kept, I would like to request that it at least go back into my user space (per User:David Tornheim's suggestion) so that we can continue to improve it as the subject's notability rises. -- Bcschneider53 ( talk) 01:40, 3 October 2018 (UTC) reply
It was mentioned above that "Patrick Henry College, a highly respected private classical liberal arts college in Virginia where Turley has given lectures in the past, considers him to be a "professor of Fine Arts" at Eastern." But that's just an example of his puffery. When a someone gives a lecture at a college (or anywhere else), they are asked to submit a brief biography for the lecture announcement. Either he wrote it, or his publicist, or his lecture agency. It does not represent their considered opinion--its a blurb. He's a high school teacher and an adjunct, who apparently would like to consider himself a college professor, even though he has actually published essentially nothing after his thesis. (I see no reason to userify--the previous career gives no hint that he will be more notable subsequently) DGG ( talk ) 02:38, 3 October 2018 (UTC) reply
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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